After 4 years of 55 horsepower i decided that I needed more power and started buying bits and pieces in the shape of Twin 40 webers, ported & polished head and a 276 courtenay cam. Later on again, i purchased a 1989 GTe Nova that met a hedge, its roof the road and ultimately its own demise. £100 swopped hands and i acquired the mangled wreck with a very strong anf FSH 98K mile 1.6i motor.
We bolted it all together
and it ran great for 700 miles (about when i joined the boards) and it blew up. Basically, I hadnt checked the head for a flat deck, (b)the jet of one choke blocked up and dettonated hell out of the cylinder and took the gasket and my compression with it
Due to work, time and financial constraints, the car stayed broken for the whole of the summer, whilst i amassed the funds to repair it.
December 04 came and after a precuationary strip of my replacment head i established some new bits were needed to get the stock spec. spare GTE head to standard.i had bought a new cam (this time of greater duration), new springs, lifters, 4 new valves (exhaust units pitted, two carburettor rebuild kits and cans of sundry carburettor cleaner etc.
Illustrates the valve seat area of No 1 Cylinder (top centre of pic) showing it had got quite dirty over the 14 years of use. Whilst bad, its repairable with a simple regrind using a valve stick and some coarse/fine paste
WIP shot
Clearly illustrates the benefit of patience and a little work - that is now ready to be re cleaned and freed of any grinding paste.
Thats as far as it gets, as atm im laid up off work with a bad knee and awaiting the decision of whether i need another (no3!) knee operation
any constructive commments more than welcome as well as comments for any technique errors.
trust me i wont make the same mistakes again, and those of you less in the know (like i was), either leave it to an expert or take more advice than i did, do research into the proper checks to make to second hand equipment and dont dive in head first. You WILL get burned.
Phil
PS: sorry its so long!